


He saved me

by Shae_la_Hyene



Series: Hurt one-shots because I cannot write anything else [5]
Category: Captive Prince - C. S. Pacat
Genre: Emotional Hurt, Hurt, Hurt No Comfort, M/M, Titanic AU, mentions of abuse, you know the drill
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-11
Updated: 2020-04-11
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:08:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,455
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23594353
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shae_la_Hyene/pseuds/Shae_la_Hyene
Summary: A take on a Titanic AU.I'll probably never invest the time and energy necessary to write it fully and properly, but I kinda like that as a start.Overall outline of the story, no real detail in there.Enjoy !
Relationships: Damen/Laurent (Captive Prince)
Series: Hurt one-shots because I cannot write anything else [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1948687
Comments: 4
Kudos: 17





	He saved me

Laurent is the rich kid. Since his parents and his brother’s deaths, he’s been under the control of his uncle. As he is officially the heir of the industrial empire of his father and of the fortune that goes with it, his uncle makes sure to keep a tight control on him to legitimate his hold of the fortune. Laurent is still young, he still has a few years to go until he’s 21 and finally obtains the full rights and can free himself from his uncle’s grip. But it looks far and unattainable and he just can’t do it. One night, suffocating from the court swooning over his uncle, from the powers and the rules and the appearances around him, he goes to the end of that ship he’s traveling on. A ship that was dragging him back to america, where he lost everyone he ever loved, where his life changed forever, and for the worst. He passes the rail, and prepares himself to jump in the frothing waters he can see far beyond.

Damen arrives. Damen is an artist. A broke one, never more than a few pennies in his pocket, but he won his ticket for his natal country by playing poker with his best friend Nikandros. Damen was born to a freed slave and to the apache woman he fell in love and built a life with. After their death, he left America to travel the world, mostly the old europe. But now he’s gonna be back home and start a new life there too. For a while, he had been in Paris, where he started to draw in the streets, exercising by drawing male and female prostitutes, willing to offer their time and body for that charming boy.

When Damen saw Laurent for the first time, the day they left the port, he swore to himself he’d do anything to meet him, and have everything he would give him. So when he saw him running, tears staining his cheeks, and climb that railing, he surely couldn’t let him jump.

The next day Laurent invites Damen to his part of the boat. To thank him. He hates feeling indebted to anyone. Now he’s indebted to Damen and he doesn’t know how to repay him, how to make it even. But Damen doesn’t ask for it. He just seems happy to spend time with Laurent, and talk to him about his life, asking about Laurent’s, and showing him his drawings. And Laurent doesn’t know how to deal with that.

When Damen is invited to dinner in the upper class restaurant, Laurent is afraid of how his uncle is gonna try to destroy Damen’s confidence, diminishing how he saved Laurent’s life and showing how much, for everyone there, Damen’s life was worthless compared to theirs. But it doesn’t happen. His uncle hadn’t predicted Damen, and his invincible confidence and mind, how he would be mannered and charming, and utterly perfect and flawless.

As they spend more and more time together, Laurent remembers to love life, and to believe in the future and the possibilities of it. He remembers how to be happy and how to care and love someone. His uncle hates it, and hates Damen. He knows his control over Laurent is slipping, and grips him tighter. 

But it doesn’t matter anymore. With Damen, Laurent is discovering he can be free, and falls in love more and more every hour. 

One night, Laurent decides that he wants him. In every way he can. He wants to taste that desire he can see in Damen’s eyes. So he takes his golden circlet, bearing the three heavy diamonds in it, and tells Damen about how his father and uncle cared so much about it, because it’s the sign that they’re the last that still holds in them the blood of the french royal family. That they were convinced that somehow that represented their worth and how they were above everyone else. And he asked Damen to draw him with it, only with it. 

So Damen does, as Laurent is draped naked on a couch, his hair slightly mused and his cheeks flushed, and he wonders if that is what he would see if he woke up next to Laurent after they’d made love. But when they do make love that night, it’s even better than anything he could have imagined. 

After that, they run away from Govart in all the ship, Laurent laughing and smiling and telling Damen he loved him, and it takes Damen’s breath away. Laurent tells him he doesn’t want to be the heir to an immense fortune anymore. He makes Damen promise he’ll take him away from it, and go to his tribe and ride for days in the great empty lands there, and live pennilessly and freely wherever they want to. And Damen is helpless, he promises. 

When his uncle tricks Damen into being accused of stealing the crown, Laurent doubts. Maybe he shouldn’t have been blinded by those childish feelings. Isn’t money supposed to attract poor people like Damen ? Damen shouts and screams, he begs Laurent to listen to him. And he hates seeing his uncle’s hands on him, and how empty and broken he looks under that touch. Laurent lets them take Damen away.

But it only lasts a moment. Because Damen is unable to lie, and Laurent loves him for it, and he knows his uncle is evil and would do anything to keep Laurent under his control. 

So he runs away from him, and go find Damen.

The boat is already drowning by then. But he doesn’t care, because Damen is alone and he thinks Laurent abandoned him.

When his uncle says he’d let Damen come with him in that other boat he paid his place in, Laurent believes him for a second. He had seemed to care for Laurent, after all, like he did when Laurent was younger. His touch was paternal, and he sacrificed his coat because Laurent was cold. And then he doesn’t. Because he’s not willing to take that risk. He’s not willing to go on in life if Damen is not with him to live it. So he jumps out of his safeboat, and runs to him.

There must be enough room on that broken door, Laurent thinks. Because he can’t let Damen out of it, in that icy water. There is enough room. But Damen is so big and the door so small, and there is not enough room. But it’ll be alright, Damen is always so warm, he doesn’t fear the cold. They just have to wait until the boats come back. 

But time passes and the boats don’t come back and Laurent is so cold. Damen order him to stay awake, not to fall asleep, not to give up. Then he makes him promise to continue believing in life and in future, and to live a very long time, far away from those icy waters, and says that he’s only allowed to die very very old, warm in his bed. And Laurent promises. 

When the boat arrives, Damen doesn’t answer, and Laurent screams and cries, but he remembers his promises, and after a last goodbye kiss, go find his survival on that boat. 

When they arrive at New York, he doesn’t give his real name to the official establishing his list. He said to Damen that he didn’t want to be that heir anymore, and he meant it. Let uncle have his precious money, and Laurent will have a real life. In a secret pocket sewn in the coat, Laurent finds his circlet.

Laurent lives a full life, and realizes every dream he had with Damen, and thousands of others. As he gets old, he settles, and opens an orphanage, rescuing and housing lost kids that suffered enough for a lifetime already. 

84 years after the Titanic drowned, someone finds his drawing, the one Damen did of him, and it passes on the television. With the help of Nicaise, Laurent goes to their ship and claims it. He says he’s very lucky to have Nicaise. He could have left the orphanage years ago, but he stayed to take care of Laurent. The men who found the drawing tell him they were looking for the circlet, and ask him if he remembers anything about it that could help them find it. 

So Laurent tells him his story.

“Damen was the love of my life,” he finishes. “But nobody else remembers him, now. Nobody even knows he existed, there is no trace of him. The only things left of him now are my memories and a soaked drawing. But he existed, and he was extraordinary and he saved me.”


End file.
